


Christmas at Stark Tower

by NephthysMoon



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 21:18:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5471090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NephthysMoon/pseuds/NephthysMoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve has a crush on his partner. Sif's only been in love with her prince for centuries. Watching the two of them spend the holiday with other people is probably the hardest thing they'll have to do. Perhaps it's just best to keep one another company in their misery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Christmas at Stark Tower

Christmas at Stark Tower wasn’t really his cup of coffee. Of course, lately, his cup of coffee was whatever Natasha brought him, around six in the morning, and usually had too much sugar for his tastes, but he drank it anyway. He did a lot of things for Natasha. He went on dates with admittedly beautiful women who always slightly bored him because they were missing that something extra he’d come to expect from conversation, he drank coffee that was too sweet and barely tasted of coffee at all and had a price tag that he still hadn’t adjusted to, he went on undercover missions that he didn’t always agree with because ‘the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few’, he watched movies about spies and ripped the inconsistencies apart with her – and he put on a penguin suit and attended a Christmas party at Stark Tower with the rest of the Avengers.

True, it wasn’t all bad. Natasha was there, with Clint, both of them dressed to kill. Pepper had Tony on a short leash, trying to reign in the damage control as much as humanly possible – though with him, there really was only so much she could do. Thor had actually come from Asgard, and he’d even brought one of his own people. For all he was sure the woman was wearing what amounted to formal wear on their world, she might as well have been attending in her armor with her sword strapped to her back for the stares the guests were giving her - and the ones she was giving them in return. Not that he could blame her. They must have looked as strange to her as she did to them, and she looked almost as bored as he did. Thor, of course, looked as though he was enjoying himself, but he always did.

Besides, it wasn’t like Thor was there for the rest of them – he’d come for his human lover. In fact – he looked for his fellow ‘Avengers’, taking note of the various pairings strewn around the room – it looked like he was the odd man out for Christmas. Banner had invited the dark-haired Agent Hill as his date, and it seemed to be going rather well, but Steve remembered that Banner had someone else, maybe. At least there had been rumors, or maybe that was just Stark making his usual jokes. Either way, that just left him. Steve Rogers, Captain America, alone at the Christmas party. He sighed. Natasha would rip him a new one for this.

She’d been hounding him for weeks to find a date, but all of the women he’d met were just so – flat – especially when compared to the woman he’d wanted to bring – the one who was off-limits – the one who was subtly standing closer to her ‘partner’ than was strictly necessary.

It wasn’t like he’d meant to have feelings for Natasha, really. It had just sort of – happened. He wasn’t really sure what was between her and Clint, honestly, and he didn’t think anyone else was, either. Natasha was an intensely private person. The two of them could be anything from close friends to lovers, and no one would be any the wiser. And it wasn’t as though he could come out and ask. He sighed again and picked a glass of champagne from a passing waiter’s tray.

An overblown voice was butchering ‘Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas’, and he winced. Couldn’t the DJ play something more traditional? This woman added extra syllables to every single word and it was grating on his nerves.

“Is this a traditional ballad of your people?”

Steve turned to the speaker, not surprised to find it was the warrior woman from Asgard. He smiled, automatically using the one Natasha called ‘charming’, and shook his head. “Not where I’m from, no,” he said. “Steve Rogers, ma’am,” he added, holding out his free hand for her to shake.

She stared at his hand for a moment before she seemed to remember something. “Right, yes, proper greeting among your kind,” she said, shaking his hand with enthusiasm. “You are the one they call Captain America. I am Sif, or Lady Sif, if we are being formal. I am not sure how formal we are meant to be in this situation.”

Steve smiled; this was someone even less comfortable at these things than he was, and he hadn’t even known it was possible. “Well, despite everyone’s ridiculous get-up, I’d say you and I qualify as friends of friends – after all, you’re friends with Thor, and while I wouldn’t consider us close, I’d consider me and Thor friends – so, formality isn’t really necessary,” he said, trying to ease her mind.

She processed his words for a few moments, and her stiff, military bearing relaxed by several degrees. “As his friend, do you worry for him, too?” she asked, and Steve hid his confusion behind a mask of concern. “With the Midgardian girl,” she clarified after a moment. “He doesn’t seem to realize that he can’t stay here with her forever, nor can she leave this realm for ours. He has his duties on Asgard, and she has hers here. He respects those duties, but he sees them as lesser.” She frowned, and it was clear that she was worried she’d said too much in her ignorance of Earth customs.

“He thinks her work is less important than his, and she should leave it behind,” he said, summarizing. “And yet, what would she do on Asgard? How would she survive, and how long before she grew tired of life there?”

“Yes, exactly!” she said, grinning at him. He noticed how tall she was; she barely had to tilt her head to meet his eyes. “He doesn’t notice this in his infatuation, but it has to end.”

“Is that why you’re here, then?” he asked, worried that war would break out over Christmas dinner if Sif was trying to take Thor back to Asgard without Jane.

“No, he insisted I come along and view a traditional Midgardian holiday celebration,” she said, scanning the room with skepticism. “I must admit, this is not what I expected from the stories I’d heard of your world.”

“This isn’t a traditional holiday celebration,” he said, snorting. “This is a Stark celebration. If you guys are sticking around for a few days, you’ll see the real deal. From what I understand, Pepper agreed to this farce only because she has a traditional Christmas planned just for the ‘family’ on Christmas day.”

“I don’t wish to intrude,” Sif said, embarrassed. “We are not family.”

Steve put his hand on her arm, surprising himself nearly as much as her. “By family, I mean ‘the Avengers’ – none of us have a proper family, not in that way. And to us, Thor is family. And as his guest, that makes you family, too,” he said, smiling at her softly. “Stay. View the ‘traditional Midgardian holiday celebration’ that Thor dragged you to. Brag to your friends back home that you survived Stark’s idea of a holiday party.”

She laughed then, and that was usually the moment when he lost interest in any woman. No woman laughed like Natasha. Sif didn’t laugh like Natasha, either. But her laughter wasn’t like anything else he’d ever heard, and he relished it. It wasn’t the empty laugh of the women he’d dated of the past months – it was something completely different, unfettered, free, and joyful, and he welcomed that difference.

“This is something to be survived then?” she asked, raising a perfectly arched eyebrow at him.

“God, yes,” he said before he could think, and she smiled at him. “Well, to be fair, it’s mostly couples, and that’s bad enough,” he said, trying to defend himself. “And there’s the music,” he continued, wincing as the warbler (as he’d termed the singer in his mind) began butchering another classic holiday song. “And if all of that isn’t bad enough, there’s the food, which god knows where Stark got it, but I’m not sure it’s completely edible, and it’s certainly not traditional Christmas food – and then, if you survive all of that,” he pointed discreetly to the dance floor, where several couples, including, to his dismay, Natasha and Clint, were swaying in time to the warbler, who was doing her best to ruin ‘I’ll Be Home for Christmas’, “There’s still the dancing to get through.”

Sif had been hanging on his every word, soaking it up as though it was gospel of Earth – or at least Stark Tower, which it might well have been, come to think of it. “And this dancing,” she said, gesturing to the couples clinging to each other on the floor (though Natasha and Clint were doing a more traditional waltz, he was pleased to see, as were Jane and Thor). “This is mandatory?”

“Well,” he said, drawing out the word. “It’s not exactly mandatory – you’re not required to dance, exactly. But, people notice if you don’t. Natasha – she’s the redhead dancing out there right now – she’ll notice if I don’t, for example. Thor will notice if you don’t, I’m sure. And it’s not required, like I said. But yeah, people notice.” He shrugged. “I don’t think I’ve ever danced at any of these things. Stark usually throws a party for – well, just about any reason he can, actually. I can’t remember dancing at any of them.”

“Then why would your friend notice if you didn’t dance at this one?” she asked, looking puzzled.

He knew he shouldn’t have brought that up. “I was supposed to bring a date – um, I guess maybe you’d call it an escort?” he said, trying to think of a word she might know. “A companion – partner?”

“I understood ‘escort’,” she said, laughing softly. “Why did you not bring a ‘date’?”

“Have you ever known someone so incredible that everyone else you’ve ever met has just – fallen short of them?” he asked. He watched her eyes dart to Thor for a moment.

“Yes,” she said. She looked at him, and then Natasha. “I see.” She appeared to be deep in thought for several long moments. “I am not sure of the proper protocol in your realm, but I should like to be your escort for the remainder of the evening. Perhaps this way, your ‘Natasha’ will not be disappointed that you failed to secure one for this function, and Thor will see that I have assimilated into Midgardian culture well. We can keep one another company in our misery, I believe is the phrase.”

“I think it’s ‘misery loves company’, but I like the idea,” he said, laughing. “Allow me to escort you for the remainder of your stay on Midgard, Lady Sif. It will be my honor and pleasure.” He held out his arm and bowed low before her. “Also, if I may suggest this, ever so humbly, perhaps we should ask Pepper to take us shopping tomorrow, and get you dressed as a proper Midgardian lady.”

Sif’s eyes sparkled with humor. “Captain, your lady is most pleased by all of your suggestions, and graciously accepts your offer to escort her for the rest of this ‘holiday season’ of Midgard. And now, sir, I believe we are meant to dance.”

He froze. In theory, he knew how to dance. In theory. He’d never put it into practice. He’d never thought he’d have to put it into practice except maybe, in his wildest dreams, with Natasha, who knew his story, knew about Peggy, knew why he’d never danced, why he never did at these stupid things - and Sif was staring at him. “Right, yeah,” he said, his tongue feeling twice as large as usual and far too big for his mouth. “I’m not a great dancer, there’s a reason I don’t dance at these things,” he tried to explain, but she placed her hand gently on his arm, silencing his attempt.

“If you would prefer, I could teach you a traditional Asgardian dance,” she offered. “It looks very similar to the one that Thor dancing right now, and I’m sure very few of these Midgardians could tell the difference between the two.”

He smiled at her and nodded, feeling ridiculously grateful. “I’d like that, milady.”

“Escort me to the space that has been cleared for dancing, Captain,” she said, her tone commanding while her smile was teasing, and he found the combination, along with the awkwardness of her words, enchanting.

He leaned over to whisper in her ear, as they started towards the floor, “You can just say ‘dancefloor’.”

Her hand tightened on his arm gratefully.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually wrote this last Christmastime and never posted it. I intended to go five thousand places with it, and just decided tonight that I wouldn't. I'm going to leave it right here. Feel free to imagine, like I have been, that when Sif and Thor are due to leave for Asgard, no one can find either Steve or Sif, and Natasha knows she couldn't get into his rooms for their usual pre-run coffee (never mind that she's been purposely giving him vanilla lattes to see how long it takes him to crack while she drinks her black coffee and smiles every time he winces over the sugary sweetness of his) - and then finally, Tony bursts into Steve's rooms to find them, fully dressed, asleep in a cute little cuddle in front of the television. Seriously - it's the cutest image ever.


End file.
